New Madrid Fault

Over the Independence Day weekend, I took my family to the Bonne Terre Mine, about 50 miles south of St. Louis on Highway 67. It was once one of the world’s largest active lead mines, and the area around Bonne Terre is still known as the Lead Belt. Mining is still the major industry in southeast Missouri, and the area is dotted with big piles of mining waste, which the locals refer to as “chat.”

Mining in the area started way back in 1720 by French settlers; Bonne Terre Mine opened in 1860. It closed in 1962.

The so-called wi-fi golden era is over, and apparently being glad about it makes me an absolutist.

But John C. Dvorak is wrong. This isn’t about making people pay for Internet access. It’s pure security. Toilets and drinking fountains are free because the majority of people don’t abuse them. The Internet can’t be wide open and free like a public restroom because when it was totally wide open and free in the 1990s, too many people abused it. Read more